Federal authorities say they are moving to send Anna Delvey, the convicted fraudster who bilked New York's social elite out of tens of thousands of dollars while posing as a German heiress, back to Germany, where she holds citizenship. The Department of Homeland Security confirmed the deportation push to the New York Post this week, with a spokesperson delivering a blunt message about the 35-year-old's years-long run through the American legal system.
"For years, she has made a mockery of the United States court system and its immigration laws," the DHS spokesperson said. "She has been released on an ankle monitor while her appeal of removal is heard."
Then, the kicker:
"We look forward to sending her home soon."
Delvey, whose real name is Anna Sorokin, is currently free on electronic monitoring while she appeals a federal removal order. Her lawyers did not respond to the Post's request for comment. The case has become a flashpoint for a broader question: why a convicted criminal illegal alien, sentenced to years behind bars, has been allowed to remain in the country long enough to become a reality television personality.
The scheme that earned Sorokin the tabloid nickname "SoHo Scammer" stretched across two continents and left a trail of unpaid bills that reads like a parody of high-society excess. In May 2017, she ran up a $62,000 tab at an opulent villa in Marrakech, Morocco, a bill she stuck to a supposed friend. On the same trip, she stiffed Sir Richard Branson's five-star Kasbah Tamadot resort for $20,000.
That same month, she chartered a Blade private jet to fly to the Berkshire Hathaway annual shareholders meeting in Omaha, Nebraska. Cost: $35,000. She refused to pay.
Back in New York, the grift continued. She checked into the Beekman Hotel on June 7, 2017, and stayed until June 27, skipping out on an $11,518 bill. She also refused to pay a $503.76 tab at the W New York Hotel for a two-night stay. The amounts ranged from the petty to the breathtaking, but the pattern was consistent: take what you want, pay nothing, move on.
A Manhattan Supreme Court jury convicted Sorokin in 2019 on charges of second-degree larceny, attempted grand larceny, and theft of services. The judge sentenced her to four to twelve years in prison. She was released in February 2021, having served enough time under New York's sentencing guidelines. But her legal troubles were far from over.
Within weeks of her release, Immigration and Customs Enforcement moved in. ICE took Sorokin into custody in March 2021, classifying her as a criminal illegal alien who had entered the United States on a tourist visa in 2017 and never left when it expired. She remained in ICE detention for roughly nineteen months.
In October 2022, she was released from ICE custody and placed under electronic monitoring, the ankle bracelet that has since become part of her personal brand. She has been living under that arrangement for more than two and a half years while her appeal of the federal removal order works through the system.
The administration's broader enforcement posture makes Delvey's case a natural target. DHS leadership has outlined clear deportation priorities, with criminal aliens at the top of the list. A convicted felon who overstayed a tourist visa and defrauded businesses and individuals out of six figures fits that profile precisely.
What makes the Delvey saga particularly galling is not just the fraud, it is the victory lap. Rather than keeping a low profile while appealing a deportation order, Sorokin has leaned into her notoriety. She appeared as an alumna of "Dancing with the Stars." Last week, she went viral yet again, this time for a video demonstrating how to put on tights underneath her ICE-mandated ankle monitor.
The spectacle captures something rotten about the incentive structure. A foreign national enters the country on a tourist visa, overstays, commits serial fraud, gets convicted, serves time, gets picked up by ICE, gets released on a monitor, and then leverages the whole saga into a media career, all while the deportation order she is fighting grinds forward at bureaucratic speed.
Meanwhile, Congress has struggled to fund the very enforcement apparatus tasked with handling cases like hers. The Senate recently left town without passing a major immigration enforcement spending bill, leaving agencies to work within existing constraints.
DHS, for its part, appears to be signaling that the patience has run out. The spokesperson's statement, "made a mockery", is unusually pointed language for a federal agency commenting on a single deportation case. It suggests the department views Sorokin not just as a routine removal but as a symbol of a system that has tolerated too much for too long.
Several details remain unclear. The specific court hearing Sorokin's removal appeal has not been publicly identified, nor has a timeline for a ruling. The statutory grounds for the removal order beyond the visa overstay and criminal conviction have not been spelled out in detail. Her current location, which ICE field office holds jurisdiction over her monitoring, is not public.
Her legal team's silence is notable. Delvey's lawyers did not respond to the Post's request for comment, leaving no public defense of her position on the record. Whether she has a viable legal argument to remain in the country, or whether the appeal is simply buying time, is an open question.
What is not an open question is the underlying record. She entered on a tourist visa. She overstayed. She committed felonies. She was convicted. She served time. ICE classified her as a criminal illegal alien. A removal order was issued. DHS is now moving to enforce that order.
The administration has made clear that enforcement actions will not be limited to low-profile cases. Officials have pledged a sharper deportation push across the board, targeting individuals with criminal records and outstanding removal orders regardless of how many Instagram followers they have.
The Delvey case is a small story in the grand scheme of immigration enforcement. One person. One removal order. One ankle monitor. But it illustrates a larger dysfunction: the gap between conviction and consequence, between a court's judgment and the government's ability to carry it out.
Sorokin was convicted in 2019. ICE picked her up in 2021. She was released onto a monitor in 2022. It is now 2025, and she is still here, still appealing, still posting, still performing. The legal process that was supposed to end with her removal has instead become the backdrop for a second act.
For every day the system allows a convicted criminal illegal alien to remain in the country while building a brand off her crimes, it sends a message. Not to the serious people who follow the rules, file the paperwork, and wait in line. To them, the message is: you're doing it wrong.
DHS says it looks forward to sending her home soon. Millions of Americans who played by the rules would say: what took so long?
